I have a smart house. I turn off the heat at night and the furnace ignores me. It says, 'Nuh-huh, idiot, your pipes will freeze." Oh. Everything is creaking.

And then there's the cats. They are acting very mentally ill, even for them. They run around, smacking into walls and careening off the rugs, which end up bunched and askew. Then there's the stalking thing they do, arching and puffing up and behaving all menacing with each other, as if they have never seen each other before (except for the last seven years). If humans behaved this way when it was cold outside, well, the work environment would be difficult.

"Stop stalking me, I'm trying to work here!"

"Don't you puff up your fur at me, young lady!"

(during a trip to HR)

"And then she slid all the way across the room, banging into the filing cabinets and knocking all the xmas cookies to the floor. She made the crazy eyes at me and ran out of the room sideways. I think she needs professional help."

It's New Year's Eve. I bet you already knew that.

Just realized I am exhausted. Clinic today and the new birth center ready to move into. Sheesh, I haven't even seen the finished product.

Working is incompatible with my artistic life and my love life. I need to be two or three people.

I think I'll sleep on the couch. It's freezing out there.

Because my manuscript wasn't published in 2010, it will be published in 2011.

And that is all I know.

Meanwhile, I will continue to write many unbreakable poems.

Back from Cal again, this time with the family in a wee house and even wee-er kitchen. We ate mass quantities, laughed and played and, in general, had a merry xmas. Yesterday we went to the SF MOMA and viewed marvelous photos: Warhol, Maplethorpe, Cartier-Bresson, and many others. The exhibit was voyeurism, all kinds. Over the shoulder, above, hidden cameras, from far away; lovers, hookers, children, war criminals.

I bought one of my daughter's photos in the gift shop. A polaroid.

My neighbor gave me her annual plateful of cookies. And I went over with a bottle of local port because no grape jelly this year. None. The grapes were small and sour and nasty because we had no summer at all. A tragedy. Didn't stop the raccoons.

My clerk at the pet store where I buy very expensive cat food told me why cats bring in dead, dying or still kicking creatures, mostly smaller and mostly with feathers. Are you ready for this? Apparently, they are trying to teach us how to kill. They never see us drag in a dead deer so how can we possibly know how to procure food. We can open cans and shake out bags of kibble into their bowls. But we are woefully inadequate in the killing department. So they're showing us how, like they show their kittens.

Aw, wasn't that heartwarming?

Delicata squash are the best squash in the world today. Eat the skins. They're good for you. I promise.

Returned from a retreat in rainy windy Northern California, land of wild turkeys, deer, bunnies and birdies.

My bank called to tell me I haven't yet paid my mortgage. Huh? I'm sure I did, even though love has thoroughly scrambled my few remaining brains. So I apparently sent the mortgage payment to my zero balance CREDIT CARD. Duh, what a dope. But the bank guy was very grumpy, having to tell people all day their mortgage payments are late and they're facing collections. To no avail did I protest that THEIR BANK had my money, cashed and all. And the nice credit card people won't have a check to me for 10 days. Great.

Merry X-mas and good will toward (ahem) men. Even though I've been a good customer for, count 'em, 15 years. Off to collections for you. Off with her head. And while you're at it, paint those roses red, little missy.

Glad I got that out of my system. Back to being a Buddhist. Where I'm kind to everyone, even the poor suckers whose job it is to threaten people they've never even met.

Can't harsh my bliss, nothing can. I'm getting to know my paramour and I like her even more now. This is a very good sign. We played in her studio and made presents and listened to Nirvana real loud.

The divine abodes: Metta, karuna, mudita and uppeka. Lovingkindness, compassion, sympathetic joy and equanimity. A beauty. I might get used to being happy, after all.

I have a terrible problem. I haven't read last week's NYT and now there's another one, fresh from it's blue plastic bag, oh and the book review and magazine section from 2 weeks ago. Even when I weed out the sports, financial and travel sections, there is still a towering pile of unread NYT. And I'm leaving tomorrow for silence and next week there will be ANOTHER NYT to read next Sunday. More than any other backsliding, not keeping up with the paper is a dread sin. Because I hardly know what is going on in the big world, the NYT is my source, my family friend who comes over to tell me I really must get out more and stop wearing those awful baggy pants in the yard and why o why do you insist on not bathing. I mean really, why bathe if all you plan to do that day is muck about in the garden, getting mud inside your gloves and sweating all over the mashed leaves and dead morning glory while trying to wrassle them into those stupid paper bags just for the purpose of 'green' waste.

So.

It's the new lover. Besides being all confused during the day and not knowing what day or time it is or if you're supposed to go to work or not, there's the issue of non-sleep and having someone else beside you when you wake up, stealing the covers and making you laugh so hard you fall out of bed. All the cats come up and want some of the mirth. All three of them. They feel neglected and you know what. I don't give a shit. I deserve this. We all do.

Besides, the NYT has the most ridiculous ads in the world. An article about starving Haitians next to an ad for a 5 zillion dollar fur coat draped over an anorexic 16 year old. It's a perfect mind fuck.

I'm off to yet another retreat, this time in northern California where they have polite rain and sun. The deer graze on the hills and wild turkeys wander about acting ridiculous. They, of course, don't think they're ridiculous. They think they're handsome and fine. If I had a face with bright red wattles hanging off it, I'd wear a bag on my head. Just saying...

I have to pack, something I loathe. Whenever I get to where I'm going, my packing seems so inferior compared to others. On retreat, I want to wear stained sweats and floppy shirts. I think in Northern Cal this type of dress is illegal. We're not supposed to compare but I can't help it. Especially when the persons sitting all around me in the beautiful dharma hall look so put together and calm. I'm a seething mass. I bet there are snakes and beetles and popinjays swirling around my cushion. (I always wanted to use 'popinjays' in a sentence).

Six days of silence and a lot of vegetables. Live oaks on the hills. I'll visit them every day. They are womanly trees. They are massive and ruggy and they lay their huge limbs on the ground. I always miss them.

I start teaching in January. I approach teaching with caution. It's a lot of effort and students tend to text, email and behave distractedly. We didn't have multiple devices when I was in school. We had pens and notebooks. I got there on horseback. Or I walked 10 miles in the snow. And I was grateful.

That last bit was all lies.

This one's for you.

I had a 1954 dinner with some of my favorite people last night. I laughed so hard my stomach hurt. What is a 1954 dinner? What you'd expect: baked potato, peas, iceberg lettuce quarters with Thousand Island dressing, salmon and an amazing relish contraption-actually a red cabbage stuck with toothpicks on which were impaled olives, cheese, leetle onions and radishes. AND rice krispie treats, gack.

It was beautiful. I love you, James and Richard and Deb. Let's grow old(er) together. You are my people, you know. In so many ways. You're irreverent, queer, tender and deviant. Blessedly deviant. Thank g-d.

I just made a gingerbread for my love. I put in too much baking soda and had to scoop some of it out and I added a wee bit of sugar and walnuts which weren't called for. But.

I'd do anything for her, my darling. Because she won't ask me, I can say that. She offered me her house. I offered her mine but hers is a better deal cuz it's paid for. I still owe about a hundred million dollars on mine.

She'll eat my fallen gingerbread and declare it the best she's ever tasted. I can't worry about when this will wear off. Maybe it won't though I can't imagine that. I've been depressed for so long, the snake keeps talking in my ear.

Fuck you, snake and your hissing. Fuck you.

Watching Nirvana at Redding. Jumping and twitching. An antidote to the Christmas ships down the street. There's a guy on the stage who's only job is to thrash around on the stage and dislocate his entire body. That's me.

Kurt, effing genius.

The bright sun in the bright sky. One of my katz has taken to peeing by the back door because I am in love right now and my head/heart are in the treetops floating down the Skagit walking through walls seeing into beauty everywhere. So.

We've spoken, Lola and I. Because she is my favorite, she needs to understand that I need this time to be untethered from the real world, whatever that is. Poking daisies into gun barrels and lyiing on the grass watching stars move across the sky singing o singing. Happiness.

Here. There's enough for everyone. Even you. Especially you.

Beth, eternal love muffin zippety-do-dah, Coyote

Back from retreat. I'm moving to Canada. People are nicer there and so are the dogs. Plus they have health insurance for everyone. Even their road signs make sense. The only thing is the kilometer issue. And centigrade. It was 15 degrees centigrade. Whatever does that mean?

This morning I saw a pileated woodpecker. And snow geese. And an eagle. In the beautiful Canadian woods. Where I will be moving, if they let me and if this country doesn't stop misbehaving.